My last engagement was exactly 2 years ago, after nearly 3 years struggling with successive difficult working environments (bad employer, bad project, bad client). My savings ran out 12 months ago and I still couldn't find a job. Since then I've lived frugally, off of my line of credit and credit cards. Moving to a cheaper country helped to slow the bleeding.
After my last client 2 years ago, I got into reading/listening to philosophy, which eventually led to a steady contemplative practice. 3 months into it, it became difficult to motivate myself to do anything except listen to guided meditations, satsangs by various teachers, contemplate into the sense of self, or go on daily long walks across town doing the same.
A year ago, some motivation came back, which allowed me to do a few coding problems every day. Then about 5 months ago, I started to let go of some personal attachments (identity patterns, beliefs about me, about life, about the world, about my place in it) and motivation started to steadily come back in, but with a lot of detachment. 3 months ago I started prepping to find a job again. I bought a few books and joined a few online courses to fill the gaps in my resume. I've accepted that I may need to get back on the horse at half my previous salary. I think I would be fine with even a third and probably less, if it didn't look so suspicious to my would-be employer, lol. I have an unwavering trust that things will work themselves out just fine, so even when I experience bouts of stress, they're quite brief.
I have some short term goals, but little ambitions. I can still see the achiever in me, but he's slowly dying. I'm fine with that. I'm trying to be fine with how the world is generally. If I feel that I can help make things easier for someone right now, I can try. But I've accepted that I'm no messiah. There are no messiah. Nobody knows shit about how this or that ought to be. Now or in the future. I'm coming to peace with success really meaning experiencing breath or taking a step.
Lately, I've started adding some of the new skills that I acquired in my resume and it correlated with some reactions on my latest applications. Causation? Maybe, I don't know, but there's hope. One thing that will probably change even after I find work, is that I'll execute on my other interests, which I kept putting off, because of some far away grandiose objectives. My recent struggles with money and employment in tech have also revealed a vulnerability and a dependency. I see that I need to be more resilient and adaptable. Next time the industry comes up with new interesting shenanigans to test me, I'll probably be moving on to something else. Beekeeping, fungiculture, soap making, or whatever. I'll probably even start a few projects on the side while employed. I love coding and will probably keep doing it until my mind wavers, but it has to stop being my identity.